SNOWpinions

I had a blast over the past couple of weeks helping the first graders with their special SNOWpinion writing pieces. After talking with the first grade teachers, it was decided that we would have students type their pieces on a collaborative Google Slides document in order to get some authentic keyboarding practice while also exposing them to working on a collaborative document. This was the first time these kiddos have experienced working on a collaborative document and with a little careful planning, and a pinch of patience, everything went off without a hitch. Having an index slide definitely made this endeavor super easy.

 Headache Saver:  Make sure that all of your students are on their slide and that the cursor is blinking on the frame they're going to write on. We had a few deleted slides and kiddos working on others' slides in one class as they didn't click on their frame before starting.

After everyone finished their writing, we saved the file as a PDF and then printed off the file so each student could display their writing in the hallway along with a snowman art project they had created.


During our planning time, the teachers also shared that one of their objectives was to have students present their pieces as they wanted to focus on presentation skills such as voice volume, clarity, and speed. After some discussion, we decided that we would have students use DoInk's Green Screen app to share their piece to add an element of authenticity and fun. Students choose the background they wanted and then bundled themselves up to create their SNOWpinion presentations. The end results were adorable and the students did a fantastic job practicing and preparing for their speeches. As students finished, they uploaded their SNOWpinion to Seesaw where they were able to share it with their peers as well as their parents. 

 Green Screen Tip:  Have all of your background images saved to one iPad so you're ready to go. We did all of our videos "live" right in DoInk with the background image already inserted. As you finish each recording save it to the camera roll for ease of uploading it to Seesaw, YouTube, etc later on. 

 Add-on Alert:  After all of the students' were finished, I imported their DoInk movies into iMovie. (This was super easy to do because all of the videos were on one iPad!) I added a title frame from our shared Google slide deck and some background music and then shared the finished movie with the teachers for them to share with their students as well as parents via Seesaw. We also talked about how this video could be used at conference time by having it playing on an iPad on a continuous loop outside of their classrooms for parents to enjoy while they are waiting for their child's conference. Here's what the finished video looked like: